


To Take Steps

by LittleRaven



Category: Tales of the Crystals
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-23
Updated: 2013-12-23
Packaged: 2018-01-05 17:27:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,902
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1096568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleRaven/pseuds/LittleRaven
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>To fight is a process.</p>
            </blockquote>





	To Take Steps

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ronia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ronia/gifts).



> I loved your prompt - I want all the girly epic fantasy movies! And stories! What would one task like in the game, in such a context, look like? So I wrote this.

The storm was coming. Lysandra huddled below a stone bridge, in a dry streambed. With the winds sweeping through already, there was no time to return to the village before it hit. She hoped there would be no thunder or lightning; a forest fire was not needed at the moment. Lady Orianna - and rest of the Forest Council, its peoples - did not need more bad tidings. 

Lysandra hadn't even gotten to the edge of the forest. The creatures she had managed to help would no doubt sicken again; if some were lucky, they would need nothing beyond more rest. Another gust brought the first brush of rain, light on her face. A purple cabbage leaf followed - she touched her crystal too late. She peeled it off with a gloved left hand, still holding her green crystal with the other. The leaf edges stuck wetly, leaving sweet-smelling juice that she closed her eyes to avoid. She cleaned most of it on her glove. It would likely need burning. 

In the full two hours it took for the storm to abate, Lysandra curved into the hollow between her bridge and the ground, back aching, never letting the crystal go. Lady Morphia was not losing this bout yet. Neither would she. Lysandra looked about the flattened leaves swirled around fallen branches, then pushed them aside as she followed the streambed up to the village. She would arrive by sunset. 

Mermida met her there, looked at her face, the crystal in her hand - "you seem to have come off worse on this visit," - "I probably have," she smiled - and slipped an arm around hers. "Let's not show it to everyone here for now." Mermida jabbed her free arm in the direction of Lady Orianna's Glen. "The Forest Council needs us now." 

Lysandra kept her smile. It wasn't going to be an enjoyable meeting, but Mermida's quick gesture would protect the village - and Lysandra herself - from additional loss of morale. It was possible that the poison hadn't done much damage, and a quick way to remove it might be discovered at this Council Meeting. At the moment, there was no need to give the villagers something more to be worried about. Lady Orianna was waiting. 

They set off arm in arm, Mermida waving cheerily at the occasional person who sought to meet their eyes. Lysandra nodded instead. Upon reaching the Glen, she accepted the help as Mermida led her down the climb. It wasn't needed - but she was so very tired, and it was support she didn't have to take from her crystal. Almost as soon as they reached the bottom, the ground seemed to carry them forward. She looked up at Orianna's eyes, glittering cat yellow as they watched Lysandra's right hand. 

"Thank you, Lady," she murmured. Orianna accepted this and Mermida's greeting with a short nod, said only: "We'll look at what can be done. Everyone is here." 

Elmarie and Florentina, sitting cross-legged on the grass two steps away from Old Man Oak. Lysandra and Mermida joined them and stretched their legs out, leaning slightly against his thick roots. 

"We haven't found any unicorns, " said Florentina. 

Elmarie added, "But there might have been a trail." 

Lady Orianna began the meeting. Queen Llanoor reported on her fairies - "Lysandra has saved many of them from dying," she acknowledged, but "today's storm has hurt her work, and swept healthy people away besides" - followed by Banach on the village: "we were safe, but our food was not. We are still recovering what part of the harvest we can." 

None of it surprised Lysandra. The fairies could have been no match against a storm that sudden, and no human could have done more than take shelter. She would have to make more visits now, to strengthen them against the lack of food. 

Old Man Oak's rough voice brought up what did have her curiosity. "A sign of the unicorns has come, I have seen it. The light of their horns has touched my branches." 

Florentina's grip tightened on her journal. "Mermida found hoofprints today, all around the edges of the village. They didn't" - of course the storm had ruined them by now - "look like unicorn prints, more like deer, but she saw beneath the magic." Her fingers, Lysandra noticed, twitched towards the edges of the journal, as if she had the urge to open it and look again. 

"I did. I saw a circle of prints around the village. There were unicorns there, and they were running. Salt was in every print." Mermida shook her head slightly, shoulder-length curls bouncing. "Wet salt. I couldn't tell with what." 

Elmarie placed her palms on the grass beside her, seemed on the verge of pushing herself up. "I think we must visit Lady Morphia. At least her castle." 

It hadn't been in Lysandra's plans; she'd intended to keep visiting those who needed her. Still, the remaining juice prickled the skin of her face, and she found it hard to move her hand from its cramped grip on her crystal. Elmarie kept speaking, glancing at her now. 

"There won't be time for many more people to get healing before another storm, or a plague, or some other poison strikes us."

Lysandra stepped in. "I wasn't able to finish before the storm," she nodded towards Queen Llanoor, "and I have been touched by the poison. Though I feel no effects yet." They all spent a moment's gaze on her hand.

Lady Orianna asked for objections; none were given, and she confirmed acceptance of their mission, ended the meeting. "Even one unicorn found will undo much of the damage," she said. 

The glove with the poison - Lysandra made to take it off, give it to Lady Orianna for safekeeping before she left with her Queen. "Lysandra," she took the hand with the crystal in both of her small ones, "keep wearing that, at least until this task is done. Whether you succeed or fail, it might be of use in it. You are better able to understand it than I." Her wings fluttered more rapidly for the moment before Lysandra's "Lady, as you command."

Wind burst through the Glen. Lady Orianna was blown off her hand, Mermida pulled Lysandra till they were lying down, Elmarie and Florentina beside them, Old Man Oak rustling his branches to make a shield. The air went quiet again.

A sharp-edged moon lit Banach, sprawled unmoving - he'd been getting up, Elmarie had told him they wouldn't be returning to the village before the trip. His blood had been blown around him. Old Man Oak moaned at drops on his roots. "Look for the unicorns first. I will take the search for Queen Llanoor and Lady Orianna." 

"No time for more of a plan," whispered Elmarie. "Our coming can't be that much of a surprise, but being there now is the closest we'll get. When she doesn't know whether we're dead and when we might be putting our leaders first if we aren't. Mermida, you go first. Lysandra, you go last." 

The poison glove could not be allowed to touch anyone. Florentina held the arm that was safe, journal in pocket and hand on her purple crystal of invisibility. She linked that arm with Elmarie's, who touched Mermida with the other. Mermida held her red crystal. In a line that was awkward no matter how many times they'd had to make it, they kept to the edge of the forest as they left the Glen, under a night with no clouds. 

Approaching Lady Morphia's territory took no more than an hour; the scent of purple cabbage would not be contained. But now they had to cross the swamp. Goblins guarded it, lived and flurried about in it. Elmarie said to keep going; goblins were the "second best" (a smile at Florentina) disguise they would have. It was true enough, thought Lysandra. The goblins had a village of their own here, around the castle. Lady Morphia was a good provider. Although it meant danger for the future of fairies and humans and forest, it made missions like these simpler, when they didn't get caught. 

Mermida used her crystal, divined the way through the crowds. "I can't see tracks here," she whispered. "But I can see the salt. I can smell it." They followed her through the village, to the very edge, where Lysandra's knees buckled. It didn't break the line, though Florentina was jerked down before Lysandra staggered up. Elmarie checked for undue attention. Florentina slipped her arm around Lysandra's waist. 

"I was hit," Lysandra mumbled quietly. "Like a whip." She stopped to notice her glove had fallen, the poison disappearing. 

"There are vines here-" Mermida hit the ground, lost Elmarie's hand. 

Goblins were on them in seconds, Elmarie reaching for Mermida, preserving the best advantage they had, even lessened. Lysandra reached for the glove - Lady Orianna's words hummed in her ears. 

Vines wrapped her hand. Lysandra let Florentina go. A pull. She plunged through the dirt, onto the soft plants beneath. The sounds above mingled with that of her head hitting the ground, the overpowering sweet cabbage juice scent beneath. Her grip on the crystal had loosened. 

She pushed herself off the ground, scrabbling for the crystal. It was so small. Lysandra rolled away from the crushed leaves. Light sparked in the corners of her eyes; she blinked many times, she had no idea how long it had been since her fall. The light was so white and yet it didn't hurt. She blinked again. 

Unicorn light. And...the cabbage scent covered that of salt. She could smell it now, without the aid of Mermida and her crystal. Mermida. Swaying, Lysandra raised her dress, wrapped it around her hands, and felt the cabbages. She had the crystal. The poison would be stalled. She staggered in the direction of the light, its spark soft in her eyes, filling her head - Lysandra ignored everything else for it, forgot to think of time or that staggering was anything but usual. 

Everything was light and salt. There was only one unicorn here - the others? It lifted its head at her steps, forehead clotted with blood. She was dizzy still and knelt by its forelegs. Salt stuck to her dress. The ground was covered in it. Its head lowered again, nuzzled her right hand. Lysandra opened it. She clutched the smooth legs, pulled herself up with quiet groans, and pressed the crystal to the unhealed wound. It closed; a short stump of horn emerged from the skin. 

One unicorn, damaged. Lysandra was sure the horn could grow again. If the unicorn could escape. Why was it here, left wounded? It nuzzled her again. She draped her arms around its neck and stumbled not to fall when it knelt. She had no better ideas - she climbed its back and wrapped her arms around the neck again, thought of the crystal and the horn. 

It trotted, it galloped, it leapt and the air was sweet with cabbages and wind moved over them. The horn was a yard's length again. They were in the village. Her friends were not. Mermida was not. Lysandra slid off as the unicorn knelt again. People looked out of their windows and doors, silhouetted in light. 

She couldn't go back alone. She would need the villagers, she would need the fairies, Old Man Oak. She needed to do her work. The people came. Lysandra spoke.


End file.
